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Arcadia City
Driving up the interstate, just past the exit for Laurel Valley where the hill peaks, sunlight floods the city from the east, illuminating the towers of Downtown Arcadia like burnished gold. Three buildings in particular dominate the skyline, with one of them a skeleton from its middle floors on up. And from those heights the city of Arcadia spreads out, smaller buildings reaching from Lyceum and Paloma in the east to Mantinea and the Folly in the west. The interstate first cuts across the crodwded, narrow streets of Mantinea. The oldest section of town, Mantinea's neighborhoods are all lined up in neat little rowhomes, no yards or fences between neighbors. Just the occasional claustrophobic alley that can let folks pull around from the street to the back lots of Mantinea's city blocks. Aroania is briefly visible on the eastern edge of the city, tucked away at the far end of the Elizabeth River. Aroania is near to the factories and mills of Folsom, a town that was the birthplace of Chase Industries. Workers from Aroania keep the fires burning at Chase Ironworks, and the Ironworks in turn keeps construction materials flowing back into Arcadia for its towers' long climb towards the sky. When the interstate crests over the Elizabeth River, over off to the east, broken buildings, with rusted-out cars abandoned on the sides of roads mark the edges of Paloma, still suffering from the economic collapse in the 1980s and slowly rebuilding from the earthquake of New Year's Eve 2011. Paloma Station comes into view on the right, slathered with graffiti. Once it took hundreds of hard-working men and women across town to the factories and mills of the Folly and the docks at Mantinea, but that has slowed to a trickle over the last decade. The railroad keeps pace with the interstate until they veer apart, and a statue of a woman with an ancient helmet brandishing a spear is visible to the left, at the far end of a long, wide road that leads to the heart of Downtown Arcadia. Athena Triumphant has stood for over a century in Arcadia City, part of the city's rebirth at the dawn of the 20th Century. Behind her is City Hall, and farther back are the great towers of Arcadia: Atlantic First Financial Tower, the half-completed Insight Building, and the largest of all, the Parnassus Building. Sybil Park is just far enough from the Parnassus Building that it doesn't quite fall beneath its shadow. The park was only reborn in the past ten years, part of a concerted effort on the part of City Hall to breathe new life into the city. Now clean and well-lit, Sybil Park provides a lush patch of green in the steel and concrete of Downtown Arcadia. The park sits on the easternmost edge of the waterways that empty into the Cooper Bay. Athena points her spear east, towards Lyceum, where Arcadia City University and her proud museums sit. The ACU Bears in their blue and their gold are the pride of the city, a dominant force in college sports, and the faculty at the University include world-class professors of engineering, physics, biology, and the humanities. This talent draws grants from industry leaders in and around the city, and at the behest of Mayor Quentin Chase and the Virginia State Legislature, ACU has dedicated sizable scholarships to helping students from less-fortunate families get the best possible education. The working-class neighborhoods of Cooper Bay aren't easily spotted from the interstate, but the people who live there like it that way. They consider Cooper Bay the city's best kept secret, an up-and-coming neighborhood on the north side of the Bay, right across from the gray stain of the Folly, and the decaying remains of what was once Arcadia's “industrial center of the future”. Hit hard by a bad economy over 25 years ago, factories closed their doors, shipping companies abandoned the port, and jobs were shed by the thousands. It was built seemingly in the blink of an eye, steamrolling old tenements and replacing them with brand new factories and shipping centers and warehouses. It was only when the economy turned south that the miracle behind its rapid growth became apparent: junk bonds. The Folly was a house of cards, and when it collapsed, it very nearly took all of Arcadia City with it. If not for the strong industrial base in Folsom, just outside of the city, Arcadia might not have been so fortunate. The interstate finally ends at an exit for Bay Street, which runs the length of the city's north shore between the well-to-do neighborhoods of Bexley and Sutton Hill. The comfortable one-family homes of Bexley are the first to come into view with lawns since the suburbs. The lots are small, to be sure, but they are clean. The residents of Bexley may be able to get more home for their money in the suburbs, but the extra cost to live in the city and enjoy all of it services and culture are worth it. Down the other end of Bay Street is the exclusive North Shore of Sutton Hill, where the wealthy live and play. Stately homes line the streets, all the way to the shores of Sutton Sounds, where luxurious apartment buildings sit across the water from one another, always in a race to outshine one another with the finest penthouse suites. South Shore is where Sutton Hill's expensive boutiques and cafés sit, as well as some of the almost-but-not-quite ultra-elite apartments and homes. The yatch club nestled on the South Shore is where the elite come to play. At the end of any of Bay Street's side roads is the Chesapeake Bay. Neither Bexley nor Sutton Hill Harbors have received ocean-going ships in decades, and instead have become very family-friendly and tourist-friendly shopping and restaurant districts. There are some gems among the Harbors that the residents of Arcadia City know and love. In the lobbies of the hotels of the Harbors are brochures beckoning visitors to Sea Isle City, an ocean community just across the Bay from Arcadia (ferry rides are available from East Harbor for interest tourists), or to Powahatan National Forest, south of the city. Between the two is Powahatan Park, which boasts the biggest and fastest coasters in southern Virginia. And on park benches and inside bus stops all around the city, Mayor Quentin Chase regards passersby with a serious but friendly face. Emblazoned on these signs is a promise for the future. “Arcadia City: Better Every Day.” Three years into his ten-year plan for the city has brought new industry and commerce to the city, revivified neighborhoods, and clamped down hard on what was once an infestation of crime. “The future is bright,” the mayor is fond of saying, “and Arcadia will lead the way.” And with the hotbed of research that is Arcadia City University, biotech firms like GeneTech and electronics companies like Cybertrove have begun expanding into the city. Even huge multinationals like Vanguard Corporation are making their presence known in the city. The city continues to grow, and not even the earthquake on New Year's Eve 2011 was much more than a stumbling block. At a stoplight on Bay Street, the wind suddenly gusts past, shaking the car from side to side. There was a red-and-gold blur there for a moment, but it's gone now. The car shakes again from another gust, and this time the blurs are more defined: people in brightly-colored costumes are streaking past the car, flying back down south towards Downtown Arcadia. Ever since New Year's Eve 2011, the Heroes of Arcadia have been an inreasingly common sight in the city. Men and women with extraordinary powers have dedicated themselves to protecting the city and helping it to recover from the earthquake. The world changed forever that night when countless lives were saved by these selfless heroes and heroines who put their lives on the line to help others. They were immortalized forever on the front page of the Arcadia City Herald on New Year's Day 2012. Under the headline "The Heroes of Arcadia", two men were pictured lifting up huge, multi-ton slabs of concrete alongside a woman wreathed in flame and another woman carrying a large sword and creating glowing chains seemingly from thin air. Now these heroes are as much a part of the city's identity as the neighborhoods, as Athena Triumphant, as Arcadia City University, as the long history stretching back to the earliest English settlers. Now this is truly the city of the future. Welcome to Arcadia City. History A city in southern Virgina, founded in 1748, Arcadia is very much steeped in American history. Arcadia City's original borders were well within what is now the Downtown region, at the end of Cooper Bay, which runs between its namesake neighborhood and Mantinea in Western Arcadia. Sutton Hill, Bexley, and Cooper Bay were all once individual towns settled by the English in the 17th Century. The regions of Mantinea, Aroania and Lyceum were renamed in the early 20th Century during a revival of interest in the city's namesake in Ancient Greece, while the Paloma neighborhood was named in honor of one of the indigenous peoples of the area. Arcadia City Institutions For national institutions, see Institutions in the World of Paradox. Entertainment * Arcadia City Playhouse- theatre * Arcadia City University Sports Complex ** Atlantic First Financial Stadium- ACU Bears football, baseball, soccer ** Cybertrove Center- ACU baksetball, ice hockey * Powhatan Park- Not to be confused with Powhatan National Forest, an amusement park halfway between Arcadia City and Sea Isle City Shopping * Arcadia Record Exchange- music store * Chloe's Closet- second-hand clothing store * Colonial Mall- mall * Plato's- upscale clothing boutique * Sutton Hill Town Center- mall Services * Arcadia Herald- newspaper * Atlantic First Financial- bank * Channel 11- Network Affiliate that hosts "Wake Up, Arcadia!" with Ali Jewel and Soterios "Cy" Warren * Farmer's Savings & Loan- bank * WKXV 1060- AM talk radio station; network of Dean Targus Category:Games Category:Paradox Category:Places Category:Arcadia City